Preparation for our 2014 harvest started in October 2012! At that time buds formed on the branches that were to carry the fruit for the 2013 harvest and, through the pruning that followed the harvest, during the winter of 2013, these two-bud spurs were left to develop and nurture the fruit for the 2014 harvest. This means that as early as last month, October 2013, nature was influencing the quality and quantity of the 2015 harvest. It was rainy, cloudy and humid – not ideal conditions, as it is a sunny period at this time that will contribute to a fruitful harvest. We’ll just have to wait and see what Mother Nature has in store for us.Our Pinot Noir grapes, the first to be harvested each year, are looking beautiful! The vines have started to flower along with the Chardonnay.

The Syrah and Sauvignon Blanc usually start flowering a little later.

I love the vineyards in spring, they have the most amazing green foliage.

Our Sauvignon Blanc is now on sale in South Africa from Cybercellar (www.cybercellar.com) and The Wine Village, Hermanus (www.winevillage.co.za). 400 cases were collected on Wednesday afternoon for shipping to the United Kingdom.

Our Sauvignon Blanc 2010 was labelled on the 13th October 2010 and is now ready for the general public. We will ship 2,400 bottles of the wine to the UK and it should arrive in the last two weeks of November. 2,000 bottles will be left in South Africa for sales there and also back up stock to go with our Chardonnay when that is ready in early 2011. So far tastings of our Sauvignon Blanc 2010 have received a big ‘thumbs up’. A big thanks to Fiona Phillips from Cybercellar in Franschhoek, Western Cape, (http://www.cybercellar.com) for saying she will sell our wines from day 1 and also helping us import our wines into the UK.

Seven Springs announced today that it will be making it’s first wines at the award winning Iona Vineyards in Elgin (http://iona.co.za). Before we build a winery we needed somewhere to make our first vintage in 2010 so had to find somewhere to make our debut wines. Iona Vineyards was our first choice and Andrew Gunn, owner of Iona, and John Seccombe, Iona’s winemaker, agreed to allow us to make our wines at this first class winery. Our winemaker, Riana, is looking forward to working with Andrew and John as their expertise will prove invaluable to enable us to produce excellent wines.